Food for Thought

Rating: PG

Buffy/Spike

Spoilers: First Date

Summary: Spike and Buffy are sat on the couch actually having a civil conversation!  What madness is this?

She looked down at her lap, not knowing what to say to him to explain how she was feeling. 

Tonight had been a good night.  Well apart from the vamp attack early on and Xander being bled like a radiator to finish it off, but before that with the pleasant conversation and the pear thingy, that she so had to try again, it had been a nice date.

She’d been annoyed when Spike had shown up, but it didn’t have time to take root before it was knocked out of the way by concern for Xander, then after the fight was done and demon-girl – was it Lissa? – was dead, she saw him hurt on the ground, his mouth bleeding and she’d been at his side without realising she’d moved.  For the second it took to know he was okay she’d forgotten Principal Wood, she’d even forgotten her best friend.  Then the situation had re-asserted itself in her brain and it had just been – awkward.

Principal Wood had seemed really distant at the hospital and when he drove them home.  She’d asked if he wanted to meet up over the weekend to discuss the whole Slayer deal but he’d declined saying he would see her at work on Monday.  She was pretty sure he’d been shooting sidelong glances at Spike most of the time too, with a look in his eyes she’d been unable to read.  She was starting to suspect he was gay, it would explain the whole snappy dresser thing.

Spike shifted on the couch, the cushion moving and reminding her that he was there.  Like she could forget with the tingly Vampire alarm rushing up and down her spine whenever she was near him.  It was weird how it didn’t feel like usual vamp sensor of ice cold fingers, but more like a flow of electricity shooting sparks in all directions.  It was probably best not to dwell on it.   Another wave of awkward washed over her and she wished for once it could all be simple.

“I, uh, wasn’t trying to intrude earlier.  Willow tried to call, but you hadn’t taken your phone with you.”  He wasn’t looking at her.  He faced the middle of the living room sitting on the very edge of the couch like he was scared to come too close.  She studied the back of his head; she could see a very faint pinkish scar under his blonde hair, the only physical sign that he was chip-free now.  In a day or two even that would be gone.  There were no physical signs of his soul, not to the human eye anyway.  Maybe that’s why no one really believed he’d changed.  Why they believed that he still needed metal and wire in his head to keep him from hurting anyone.

“It’s okay.  It’s good that you did.”

“Yeah but you were on a date.  I shouldn’t have disturbed you.  You need your time off as much as anyone, me and the rest of them should have handled it.”  He turned to give her a little smile over his shoulder.  “Earnt our keep.”

She smiled back.  “It wasn’t really a date.  More of a field trip for work.”

“It looked like a date when I got there.”

She was confused for a moment before she realised what he meant.  “Oh the dessert thing.  Oh no that wasn’t a date thing, that was more like a mandatory life thing.  That is the closest I’ve been to Heaven since I was.  Y’know in Heaven.  I’ll take you there and you can try it and I dare you to tell me if I’m wrong…What?”

He had shifted his weight towards the arm of the couch and was looking over his shoulder at her again, his head tilted to one side and an amused smile playing over his lips.  “So you’d take me to this restaurant then?”  He asked teasingly.

She blushed.  “Well I…I mean, I didn’t mean it quite…it would just be for the Heaven, not like a date…as such.”

He nodded seriously.  “It would be a work related field trip.”

She smiled.  “And where would the work related bit actually come into it?” 

He sniffed and leaned back on the couch, she guessed he felt more comfortable now the conversation had turned away from anything serious.  She felt more comfortable too and she shifted in her place to lean back against the sofa arm and pulled her feet up under her.

“I dunno, we could do a sweep of the alleys on the way there and then talk about it over the pears.”  He rested his arm along the back of the couch and turned his body towards her.  His legs stretched out in front of him to disappear under the coffee table. 

“So we’re just gonna go there to eat the pears then, not that they’re not worth the trip alone, but there is plenty of other stuff on the menu too.”

Spike smirked at her.  “Well you’ve got a job; I guess you can afford to order anything you want.”

She untucked a foot long enough to prod his thigh with it.  “That’s not very…”  She caught herself before she said it and looked down at her hands wrestling with each other in her lap.  She missed him smiling affectionately at her.

He gave a loose shrug.  “I guess I could pay if you like.  I mean you’ve brought me enough blood over the years; I must owe you a few dozen pears by now.  Hell I’ll even throw in a main course to say thanks.”

“For?”  She asked.

“Giving me a place to stay, not staking my sorry bum all the times you should have, for everything I guess.”

The look he was giving her was too intense.  She wanted to look away but she couldn’t make her eyes obey.  She wanted to tell him this whole idea was ridiculous but a part of her didn’t feel like it was.  And that scared her.

So she stuck to the mundane.  “And exactly how are you going to afford this?  I’m not a cheap date you know.”  She grinned at him.

“Just as well it’s not a date then, isn’t it luv?”  His blue eyes were sparkling and crinkling as he grinned back.  “And it’s okay, I know where Harris keeps his bottle of quarters,  we won’t go hungry.”

She shook her head chuckling and used her foot to poke his thigh again.  “You’re bad, you know that?”

He caught her foot before she could tuck it beneath her again, and held it between them.  She looked at him, warily wondering what he might do with it and hoping it wasn’t something she’d have to punch him for and ruin the mood.

“Well like I said earlier, some girls like the bad boy thing, and I hate to disappoint a pretty lady.”  He lifted her foot high and used the index finger of his other hand to tickle the arch, making her shriek.

“No, no, no, no Spike don’t, not my foot, no don’t.  Ahhh get off, get off.”  Her voice rose as she realised she was completely at his mercy.  She arched her back off the couch trying to grab a hold of his arms but he shifted to his knees and held her foot just a little higher so she could only claw ineffectually at her own leg.  “Spike please, no more!”  She begged.  She was giggling between pleading and writhing around on the sofa trying to pull her leg out of his firm grip and still her used his surprisingly gentle fingers to tease the sensitive skin on her sole.  “Spike, no, no, no more, I can’t, I can’t…”  She panted between giggles.

A series of thumps came down the stairs causing both the Slayer and the Vampire to freeze guiltily.  The living room door was thrown open and a bed-creased Willow was in the door way with a stake held high.

“I’m here…”  She started to reassure Buffy, until she saw the Slayer’s flushed face and erratic panting and Spike’s position before her, and the fact that not only Spike, who Willow expected to be looking guilty when caught in the act of killing Buffy, but Buffy looked just as guilty, if not more so.  “Ohhh!”  She exclaimed as her brain totalled up what she was seeing.  Quickly she turned her back on the pair and put her hand other her eyes for good measure.  “I’m sorry…I didn’t realise you were…doing…that.”

Buffy extricated herself from Spike’s now loose grip and moved from the couch to stand behind the witch, small giggles still escaping from her occasionally.  “Will, we weren’t doing anything.  Well we were but not what you’re so obviously thinking, and might I add – shame on you.”

“You weren’t?”  Willow asked; still with her back turned and her eyes covered.

Spike sighed.  “No Red.  I was just giving the Slayer a little tickle-torture.  Training really.  Pointing out her weak spot so she can guard it better in battle.  That kind of thing.”

“Oh.”  Said Willow, clearly not believing a word of it.  Buffy didn’t blame her; if she didn’t know it was the truth there was no way she would have believed something that stupid.  “I think I’m just gonna go back to bed then, if no one’s being sucked...I…I… I mean bitten and drank, dry, of their blood…Goodnight!”

“What’s going on down there?  Is everything all right?”  Giles shouted down the stairs as he made his way down.

“Yeah everything’s fine Giles.  We were just training.”  Buffy called out to him as Willow scurried out of the room.

“It’s the middle of the bloody night!”  Giles grumbled loudly. 

“Sorry.”  Buffy called out, wincing at her Watcher’s tone.  She heard Giles stomp back up the stairs followed by Willow’s lighter footsteps.  Turning around she realised Spike was standing right behind her and punched him on the arm.

“Ow!  What was that for?”

“You woke them up and made Giles mad with me.”  She explained.

“You’re the one that was squealing like a stuck pig over a little bit of tickling.”  He retorted with a smirk.

“I did not sound like a stuck pig.”  She gave him an indignant glare.

He smiled at her; his eyes doing that adorable thing that she hated noticing.  She softened her look to a smile, felt the awkwardness come back and dropped her eyes to her recently tickled feet.

“I should probably get to bed, it’s late.”  She told her feet.

“Yeah.”  He sighed.

“Goodnight then.”  She looked up long enough to give him a quick smile and started to move towards the door.

“Buffy.”  She stopped at the sound of her name and turned to look at him.  “This not a date thing, did you mean it?”

She looked back at her feet again, boy were they getting a lot of attention tonight.  He waited patiently for her to look up again.  When she did she was wearing a confused smile.  She didn’t know what answer to give.  It wasn’t fair to say yes if she changed her mind when she woke up and came to her senses.  And why say no when it was all innocent anyway.  If it really was just a meal out with a friend, then surely by refusing she was admitting he was more than a friend.  After all it was just a dinner, and she ate all the time, in lots of different places so where was the big bad about that.  She gave a little half shrug.  Food had never been this confusing before.  So if she couldn’t say yes and she couldn’t say no, what did that leave?

“Possibly.”  Was all she could think to say before leaving him alone in the soft lamp-lit living room.